House GOP weighs bill to speed up pipeline re-routing

House Republicans are weighing new legislation that would ensure a faster process to re-route the proposed Keystone XL oil sands pipeline than the Obama administration is planning, a Nebraska lawmaker said.

TransCanada Corp. and Nebraska officials announced an agreement Monday to re-route the proposed pipeline away from the sensitive Sand Hills region of the state, which sits over a major aquifer.

The State Department said last week it would analyze routes to avoid the region, an analysis expected to take until early 2013, with a final decision on the project to follow.

Rep. Lee Terry (R-Neb.) said he spoke briefly on the House floor Monday with House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) about legislation that would have state and federal officials work together to ensure a new siting and environmental study within six months.

Terry, who noted an aide to House speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) took part in the brief discussion, said he expected further public input would follow such a six-month study. But it would still be faster than what the State Department projected last week.

“It seems to me that this is a quicker timeline than what was spelled out by the State Department last week,” Terry told reporters in the Capitol. “That is why we may want to do legislation to adhere to this quicker timeline.”

Terry emphasized that the floor discussion was very brief and very preliminary.

He called it a conversation about “what ifs” and said “we may not even need to do legislation,” adding there would be more talks once more details of the new agreement between TransCanada and state officials emerge.

“We may not do a bill, the agreement may be good enough, but we are just having a discussion . .  . because we are concerned about the timeline slipping even more,” Terry said.

The House passed legislation earlier this year that would force the administration to make a final decision on the Keystone XL project by Nov. 1 of this year, but it was not taken up in the Senate.

This post was updated at 8:19 p.m.